The Surgeon-General had detailed one Dr. Browne for duty at Buffalo to examine Mr. Stearns's recruits, and if found fit for service by him there was presumably no need of a second examination. This, however, did not suit the medical examiner at Readville, who either from ill will or from some unknown motive, insisted on rejecting every sixth man sent there from the West. Thus there was entailed on Mr. Stearns an immense expense which he had no funds to meet, and he was obliged to make a private loan of ten thousand dollars without knowing in the least how or where he was to be reimbursed.
Finally, on May 8, Mr. Stearns made a remonstrance against this abuse to Governor Andrew in a letter in which he also gave this account of himself:
"I have worked every day, Sunday included, for more than two months and from fourteen to sixteen hours a day; I have filled the West with my agents; I have compelled the railroads to accept lower terms of transportation than the Government rates; I have filled a letter-book of five hundred pages, most of it closely written."
This letter is now in the archives of the State
House at Boston, and on the back of it Governor
Andrew has written:
"This letter is respy. referred to Surgeon-General Dole with the request that he would confer with Surgeon Stone and Lieutenant-Colonel Hallowell. It is surprising, and not fair nor fit, that a man trying as Mr. Stearns is, to serve the country at a risk, should suffer thus by such disagreement of opinion.
"JOHN A. ANDREW."
Shortly after this Mr. Stearns returned to Boston for a brief visit, and was met in the street by a philanthropic lady, Mrs. E. D. Cheney, who asked: "Where have you been all this time, Mr. Stearns? I supposed you were going to help us organize the colored regiment? You will be glad to know that it is doing well. We have nearly a thousand men." Mr. Stearns made no reply, but bowed and passed on. This is the more surprising, as Mrs. Cheney was president of a society of ladies who had presented the Fifty-fourth Regiment with a flag; but the fault would seem to have been more that of others than her own. At the celebration which took place on the departure of the regiment for South Carolina, however, Wendell Phillips said: "We owe it chiefly to a private citizen, to George L. Stearns, of Medford, that these heroic men are mustered into the service,"—a statement which astonished a good many. [Footnote: The statement made by Governor Andrew's private secretary concerning the colored regiments in his memoir of the Governor would seem to have been intentionally misleading.]
The Governors of the Western States had never considered their colored population as of any importance, but now, when it was being drained off to fill up the quota of Massachusetts troops they began to think differently. The Governor of Ohio advised Governor Andrew that no more recruiting could be permitted in his State unless the recruits were assigned to the Ohio quota. Andrew replied that the Governor of Ohio was at liberty to recruit colored regiments of his own; but the Massachusetts Fifty-fifth, having now a complement, it was decided not to continue the business any further, and Mr. Stearns's labors at Buffalo were thus brought to an end about the middle of June. He had recruited fully one- half of the Fifty-fourth, and nearly the whole of the Fifty-fifth regiments.
He now conceived the idea of making his recruiting bureau serviceable by placing it in the hands of the Government. He therefore went to Washington and meeting his friend, Mr. Fred Law Olmstead, at Willard's Hotel, the latter offered to go with him to the War Department and introduce him to Secretary Stanton. They found Stanton fully alive to the occasion, and in reply to Mr. Stearns's offer he said:
"I have heard of your recruiting bureau, and I think you would be the best man to run the machine you have constructed. I will make you an Assistant Adjutant-General with the rank of Major, and I will give you authority to recruit colored regiments all over the country."